CPU upgrade ideas?

GTX 960$467 isn't quite as good.
The GTX 970 $733 outperforms the GTX 760.

David Sanders4 said:I honestly don't think you'll see any real gains from overclocking an HD 7770—if anything, I have a feeling you might actually end up losing performance...

I'm right there with you—there just isn't much overclocking headroom to play with compared to something like a 7850 or a 7870.

If you want my honest take—and I really mean this—you might want to consider stretching your budget just a little bit further. It’s worth it to invest in a more robust processor, like an Intel Core i7-4770K, which is definitely going to give you a much longer lifespan before you feel the need to upgrade again. As for the graphics card, if you're looking for the absolute best bang for your buck, I'd say the GTX 960 is the way to go; you can often find it priced even lower than $467
.

Kenneth Jackson3 said:I'm torn here.

I'm running a Phenom II x4 965 @ 3.4GHz
with an MSI R7770

Should I swap the GPU or the CPU first?

The processor is definitely choking specifically in Call of Duty, but if I can snag something like this:
http://www.newegg.com/p/product_info.php?id=13349
then I'd pull the trigger...
as long as that Phenom doesn't bottleneck me too hard. Obviously, if I drop cash on this now, the CPU upgrade has to wait until summer or maybe fall.

Which Intel chip would be in the same league as the one listed above?

The smart move is getting an Intel Core i7-4770K if your board supports it. It's dirt cheap and honestly much smarter... it can handle way beefier graphics without the bottleneck, whereas I doubt this Phenom could even run a GTX 760 smoothly.

It supports it. Okay, cool. I guess I’ll stick to the old plan then and just grab an Intel Core i7-4770K. 😁

Robert Rodriguez2 said:...honestly, I highly doubt this Phenom will even handle a GTX 760.

That’s just not possible; the i7-4770K has pretty much the same performance level... and even then, the ceiling for an i7-4770K is maybe an HD 7850 or a GTX 660, let alone something like a GTX 960 or a GTX 760.🙂

Look, you can approach it however you want, but while the GPU might struggle to hit its peak in modern titles, you'll definitely feel that performance boost in plenty of other games.

By the way, we were actually discussing Phenom processors earlier here: click (the 270x is slightly more powerful than a Radeon 7870—think of it as a 7870 with a Tahiti chip—but it still falls short of the GTX 760 and the HD7950, which offers massive overclocking potential).

Here is some additional feedback from PC enthusiasts regarding the GTX 760:

I tested a GTX 760 one day on an overclocked Phenom 965 running at 4.2GHz, and it just couldn't keep up with a 7970, which is clearly the stronger card...

So, let's cut the chatter and the speculation if you haven't actually run the tests yourself.

Anyway, this is getting pretty off-topic.